September 2007 - Posts
Is it just me, or do any of you think fuel surcharges have become a way of life for some companies?
Recently, after the trash company we use increased its fuel surcharge for a fourth time I decided to shop around for a new service. (OK, it wasn’t just the rising cost, customer service was also severely lacking. They often didn’t show up for no reason, leaving my garbage to become a science project on the curb.)
Gas prices go up and down but the fuel surcharges … they just keep coming. They started showing up big time last year on many of my bills; but initially I figured they’d disappear once crude oil prices started to slip. I know, prices for gas are still high, but do these firms just pocket the money when the numbers drop at the pump.
As a self-employed individual, I’m being squeezed like a not-so-juicy lemon.
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There’s nothing like a successful 16-year-old entrepreneur to make you feel bad about yourself.
We need to somehow bottle the chutzpah Cassandra Saba from Chandler, Ariz., has right now.
She started a designer jewelry business at age 11 and now spends six hours a day, after she finishes homework, making custom jewelry. She’s even gotten about 50 orders so far from her Web site.
“I have a goal -- to be a famous jewelry designer,” she says matter-of-factly.
Hopefully she will go on to become the Bill Gates of the jewelry world. But there are forces working against her. For some reason many of us women seem to lose our ambition mojo as we enter adulthood.
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Hillary Clinton is taking another crack at fixing our nation’s troubled health care system, and there’s one good thing about it: Small business owners are on her radar screen.
She’s talking about giving entrepreneurs tax credits if they perform the herculean task of providing their workers with health coverage.
I call it herculean, because it often takes mythological powers to afford the health care plans out there.
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I get lots of e-mails from readers asking me about work-at-home offers that come to them via snail mail and e-mail, and my gut reaction is always: “Trash them.”
They promise you riches, and all you have to do is work a few hours every week from home.
Does this sound plausible to you? Come on.
We’ve all heard the saying, “too good to be true.” But alas, people keep pursuing false hopes.
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Next week is my dad’s birthday, and even though he passed away a few years ago, it’s always a hard time for me.
Almost every year of his life, my father seemed to be coming up with a new business venture.
He was a stationery store owner, furrier, restaurateur, car exporter, and he even tried his hand at importing irregular, knock-off Levi jeans from a former Soviet bloc nation. That didn’t work out so well. The jeans were really irregular – the fabric die came off on your skin, and they were so rigid you couldn’t sit down in them.
I always thought he had the heart of an entrepreneur. But is there such a thing?
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Don’t fat people have it bad enough? Now they face the risk of losing money at work if they don’t shape up.
Thanks to new federal regulations that went on the books this summer, companies are allowed to charge unhealthy, aka overweight, employees more money for their health care premiums than their skinny counterparts.
I’m not kidding, folks. It’s time to put away the Twinkies and Big Macs. Your boss really wants less of you, and since wellness programs and free pedometers didn’t get you dropping those pounds, some employers now think its time to hit you below the belt -- in your wallet, that is.
Small business owners have it the hardest when it comes to health insurance. They pay more than big corporations, and because they have fewer employers there are fewer people to spread the risk. That means a couple of obese employees with major health problems can send a small firm’s insurance premiums through the roof.
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Americans pride themselves on being workaholics -- able to keep grinding away no matter what.
We don’t need vacations or lunch breaks anymore. We’re even encouraged to go back to work quickly after a tragedy. “It will keep your mind off of the pain.” Many of us have heard that before.
But, it turns out, if you run your own company, this logic is bogus, at least for the bottom line. New research shows that if the CEO of a company loses a child or spouse, his or her ability to keep the profits rolling in is derailed.
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What’s in a name? A whole lot more than a smelly rose, especially if it’s your company’s name.
So, when you’re finally ready to create a Web site for your firm don’t cheap out and don’t be dumb.
Before you do anything, here are some words of caution: Step away from the guy you met in line at the supermarket who’s trying to break into Web site design.
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